We say kar'-kis but write carcase since the reference is to a case-piece.

Are you sure? About case-piece?

Yes, I'm sure that, in furniture-work, carcase is a reference to the basic structure of a case-piece.
It's not like the term gets thrown around the shop a lot...but use of carcase is my habit.
I have written dilemna all my life, too, as have a small sector of humanity, why, we are not sure.

We say kar'-kis but write carcase since the reference is to a case-piece.

Are you sure? About case-piece?

Yes, I'm sure that, in furniture-work, carcase is a reference to the basic structure of a case-piece.
It's not like the term gets thrown around the shop a lot...but use of carcase is my habit.
I have written dilemna all my life, too, as have a small sector of humanity, why, we are not sure.

My questions is based on the appearance that carcase/carcass predates case-piece by some 200 years.

From the OED:
1663 B. Gerbier Counsel to Builders 67 Oaken Carcasse.
1679 J. Moxon Mech. Exercises I. ix. Explan. Terms 165 Carcass, is (as it were) the Skelleton of an House, before it is Lath'd and Plaistered.

I could not find case piece in the OED. Sohttps://www.1stdibs.com/blogs/the-study ... se-pieces/
The term originated in Le Garde-meuble, ancien et moderne — or the Furniture Repository, ancient and modern — a Parisian, bimonthly periodical that served as the interior design resource from 1839 to 1935.